2000 Legislative Session: 4th Session, 36th Parliament
HANSARD
The following electronic version is for informational purposes
only.
The printed version remains the official version.
(Hansard)
TUESDAY, JUNE 6, 2000
Morning Sitting
Volume 20, Number 4
[ Page 16227 ]
The House met at 10:06 a.m.
Prayers.
Orders of the Day
Hon. I. Waddell: I call, in Committee A, the estimates of the Ministry of Social Development and Economic Security, and in this House, I call second reading of Bill 2.
BUDGET TRANSPARENCY AND
ACCOUNTABILITY ACT
(second reading continued)
B. Penner: I appreciate the opportunity to rise this morning to give my thoughts about the government's proposals as contained in Bill 2, the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act. Certainly the concept of transparency and openness is one that I support, and I suspect that all of my colleagues in the official opposition join me in supporting the concept of transparency and openness.
While this bill, in my view, is a step in the right direction, it is only a timid step in the right direction. It's an improvement, but just barely, over the current situation. The shortcomings in the bill are several, and in my view, a number of them are quite serious. At the conclusion of this debate it's my understanding that a number of amendments will be offered to the government in an effort to try and make this bill better. I believe it is the duty of the official opposition not just to oppose and point out shortcomings but, wherever possible, to make positive suggestions for improvement. That's a challenge that the B.C. Liberal caucus is more than willing to accept, and I believe we will be delivering on that duty shortly.
[1010]
As for some of the shortcomings in the bill, let me get started. Perhaps one of the most glaring shortcomings is contained early on in the bill, in section 5. Section 5 of the act stipulates that it will still be up to Treasury Board -- that is, a cabinet committee -- to set the accounting principles to be followed by this government when it comes to reporting the expenditures and fundraising activities of government.
This government has a very checkered track record when it comes to accounting practices. We just have to cast our minds back a couple of years ago to what's been referred to as the fudge-it budget scandal to be reminded that this government has a very unique view of accounting principles. In my estimation, it would be far better and give far more certainty and confidence to British Columbians if the government were to accept generally accepted accounting principles as outlined by chartered accountants across Canada.
The accounting profession has established standards, not just for reporting in the private sector but for government entities, as well, across Canada. In other parts of Canada I know that those principles are adopted willingly by governments at different levels. However, it appears clear from the reading of this bill, in section 5, that the government wants to preserve its right to determine how to do the accounting on any given day or in any given year. In my view, hon. Speaker, that's simply giving this government far too much leeway, and it will do very little to restore confidence in the balance sheets of British Columbia.
I'll just read section 5(1) into the record for the benefit of those following the debate: "The main estimates for a fiscal year must be prepared in accordance with this section and with the accounting policies as established by Treasury Board." So clearly the government is leaving itself some additional wriggle room rather than binding itself to generally accepted accounting principles as should be the case.
I'd note here that for many years now, the B.C. Liberal leader and Leader of the Official Opposition has tabled in this House something called the Truth In Budgeting Act. Unfortunately, the NDP has never called that bill for debate. That bill specifically commits the government to keep the books in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. That is our position. It's not a recent conversion to that position; we have held that position for a long time. The government has still failed, in Bill 2, to live up to that standard. Enough said about that.
In section 6, you take a look a little further in the act and find another piece of wriggle room. That has to do with the budget date. In years gone by it's been a practice of various governments in British Columbia to manipulate the timing of budget day to suit political needs or wants. This current NDP government has clearly played games with the legislative calendar in years gone by. The frequent result of all of that is that considerable spending is done before this Legislature has ever considered, much less approved, the budget for the given year. In many ways it makes a sham of the legislative process, because the government relies on special warrants to cover the spending that is required before the Legislature ever gets around to considering the budget estimates.
Now, whose fault is that? Well, the date upon which this Legislature reconvenes is entirely the prerogative of the government. The opposition does not dictate or control the day upon which we come back here to the Legislature to resume our work. In previous years, we've seen that it's suited the political interests of the NDP to delay -- almost as long as possible -- reconvening the Legislature and starting the budget process. I suppose it's an effort to paper over their internal problems or to delay the inevitable accounting to the public for the misadventures in spending that this government has encountered. For whatever reason, we have not had a fixed day that British Columbians can look forward to when a budget will be presented to the public and to the Legislature.
[1015]
This bill still doesn't solve the problem. I'll point out what the problem is here. In section 6(1) it indicates that a minister "must present the main estimates for a fiscal year to the Legislative Assembly (a) at the same time as the budget for the fiscal year" -- well, that's nothing new -- "and (b) such that the budget debate can reasonably be anticipated to be completed in accordance with the Standing Orders of the Legislative Assembly before the start of that fiscal year."
What does that mean? Well, it means that the government will be required to bring in a budget in enough time that we can complete the responses -- the general speeches responding to the budget. That isn't approval of the entire budget estimates by any means; that process takes months, not weeks. This government seems to be anticipating trying to get the Legislature reconvened sometime towards the end of March by way of this legislation.
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But even that commitment has a backdoor exit clause for the government. If you read a little further, in section 6(2) there are a number of outs provided to the government. This requirement to call the Legislature sometime in March is forgiven if "a general election is underway or has recently been completed" -- of course there is no definition of what recently means -- "(b) a new Premier has taken office after February 15 in the fiscal year, or (c) a federal budget (i) has been presented after February 15, and (ii) has materially changed the fiscal forecast for the government reporting entity for the next fiscal year."
I'm interested, particularly, in section 6(2)(b), where a new Premier has taken office after February 15 in the fiscal year. Gee, can we think of any recent examples where that might have happened? I can. This government has just gone through an internal process and turmoil to select a new leader, after one of their previous leaders had to leave under a cloud of suspicion and disgrace.
I think it's inappropriate that government legislation be tailored to accommodate a particular political party's internal problems. I don't think that the business of British Columbia should have to take a back seat to a political party's desire to select a new leader. That is, unfortunately, what has happened in British Columbia over the past year. It's also what Bill 2 contemplates for the future. I for one would like to see that provision deleted from this act.
Moving along to the issue I touched on just briefly earlier: special warrants. Special warrants have also been a fixture in British Columbia politics over the last century. Many people think that their time has come and gone. Clearly at the start of the century it was difficult for legislators from across the province to travel great distances under difficult conditions to the capital here in Victoria in order to approve emergency spending.
Well, things have changed a lot in 100 years. In a matter of hours people can be just about anywhere in British Columbia if they can get to an airport. We've got an example from just one or two months ago, when the NDP government decided to legislate striking CUPE workers back to work. We got a notice late on Saturday for us to be here on Sunday. The NDP presented legislation to force those striking CUPE workers back to work. All of that was done within, I think, about 24 hours' notice.
If the government comes across a situation where it needs to get approval for emergency spending -- whether it's to fight forest fires or to deal with some other catastrophic event or natural disaster -- that can be done very easily by reconvening the Legislature. But you know what? That isn't always very convenient for the government. It's much easier for the government to simply go into the Premier's Office and sign a cabinet order to authorize the spending of millions of dollars without the hassle of public scrutiny or debate.
Now, is this just an academic argument? Hardly. Again, just a few months ago the NDP government signed one of the largest special warrants in recent memory -- I think it was something on the order of $300 million -- to cover off their overspending from last year's budget. All that could have been done here, on the floor of the Legislature, where we could ask questions about why the government couldn't live within its budget. But they chose not to. They chose to do that through a cabinet order.
[1020]
Bill 2 does nothing to prevent the government from continuing the practice of using special warrants. I refer members of this House to section 11, which specifically contemplates the issuance of special warrants. The official opposition and the B.C. Liberal Party take the view that special warrants should no longer be permitted. It's time to put an end to special warrants and to require all spending to be approved here in the Legislature. I look forward to a day when a government is willing to do that. Unfortunately, Bill 2 will not accomplish that goal -- not as written presently.
The government has said much about wanting to restore confidence in how the budget process is conducted in British Columbia. So they bring out this bill, saying that this will solve the problem. Last night I listened briefly to the member for New Westminster -- a former school colleague of mine -- talk about how now we'll have a law binding the government, forcing the government to do certain things that, admittedly, he says, the NDP has failed to do voluntarily in the past.
Well, I pose a question. What happens if the NDP government decides, law or no law, that they're not going to be open and honest and transparent? What penalties will befall them? What punishment can they expect? In other words, are there any teeth to the act?
For that answer, a person must turn to section 22 of Bill 2. I note a heading entitled "Legal proceedings." Let me just read this into the record. Subsection (1) states: "No action or other proceeding may be brought in respect of an obligation established by or under this Act, except for an obligation under section 20," which is that government organizations must provide certain information. Then subsection (2) states: "Section 5 of the Offence Act does not apply to this Act."
Section 22 -- the provisions I've just read -- absolutely guts, absolutely destroys, any meaning to this act. It prevents citizens from bringing an action to hold the government responsible for breaking the law. Subsection (2) says that the Offence Act does not apply.
I used to spend some time in the courts in British Columbia doing both criminal defence and prosecution work. The Offence Act, in some ways, is B.C.'s provincial equivalent to the Criminal Code. It sets out basic penalties and procedures for prosecutions related to provincial statutes. The basic premise in the Offence Act is that for violating any other provincial statute, a person can expect up to six months in jail and/or a $2,000 fine. That's the basic rule.
That applies in many ways to the Motor Vehicle Act, the Forest Act, the Park Act, the Liquor Control and Licensing Act -- any number of provincial statutes. There's a default mechanism in the Offence Act that says if the other statute does not specifically provide for a penalty, then the Offence Act provisions of a $2,000 fine and/or a six-month prison sentence do apply.
Well, we've just seen here in Bill 2, section 22, that the government has exempted itself from what is standard procedure for other British Columbians. In other words, this government thinks it's above the law -- again. So much for a new era of openness and transparency. This bill can almost be said to be hardly worth the paper it's written on because of that "out" in section 22.
Is this, again, an academic argument that I'm making? Would this government ever dare to violate a provincial statute -- one of its own making? Well, unfortunately, the answer to that rhetorical question is a resounding yes. Let's think of a few examples, shall we?
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I remember just a couple of years ago, we had the Electoral Boundaries Commission Act, where the government flagrantly violated the law by failing to appoint the commission when they were required to do so. They waited an entire additional year to comply with a very clearly worded act of this Legislature requiring the government to appoint the commission.
[1025]
Now, what has been a consequence of this government's failure to obey that law? We've just been presented with another bill -- I think it's Bill 16 -- that has 300 to 400 changes to the Electoral Districts Act that was passed a year ago. This government can't get it right. And a big part of the blame goes to the NDP for failing to appoint the commission in a timely manner as required by the law -- their own law. So here we have a situation that if an election had been called in the past year, I think there would have been chaos. The Elections B.C. staff are struggling to make sense of a law that was thrown together by this NDP government last year, in the dying days of the session, and was rammed through the Legislature without much time for the public to comment on it. Now they're left to pick up the pieces and try and make sense of it.
Just imagine if this government had fallen -- which is a very real possibility -- over the last 12 months. I'm not sure what would have happened. It's possible that people would have been elected based on inaccurate or illegal electoral boundaries within their districts. Think of the uncertainty that would have resulted from that. And that's all because this government, in the past, has shown a willingness to break the law.
Are there any other examples? Yes. This government was found by a B.C. Supreme Court judge to have violated Criminal Code provisions with respect to gambling. That was during this government's rush to expand gambling in British Columbia. We've seen that this government has lost numerous cases in the civil courts with respect to imposing slot machines on municipalities that didn't want them -- again, in this government's desperate attempt to wring more cash out of British Columbians who would like to engage in gambling or some who don't want to engage in gambling and who have gambling addictions.
We've also seen this government break the law by imposing probate fees that had no relationship to the actual cost of providing the service. This government had to go into the Legislature here and retroactively exempt themselves from the law that said they shouldn't have done what they just did. So it's not just an academic argument or warning on my part that this government may choose in the future to break one of its laws, because it's shown in the past that it is absolutely willing to break the law when it suits its political objectives. And Bill 2 contains no meaningful punishment for this government if they choose to break the laws contained in Bill 2.
We all know that there have to be consequences for people's actions if they're going to be held accountable. You know, as a child I probably would have gone down to the kitchen and extracted a few more cookies out of my mother's cookie jar if I'd known that there wouldn't be some form of discipline for having done that. This government has repeatedly put its hand into the public's cookie jar and has been extracting items from that jar and now exempts itself, through section 22 of this act, from any meaningful consequence.
We wouldn't treat our own children like that. We know that children have to be taught that there are rules and there are consequences. But this government doesn't want to apply that basic philosophy to themselves. They think that they're above the law.
If all of the foregoing problems that I've just discussed aren't bad enough -- the lack of generally accepted accounting principles, the lack of a fixed budget date, the continued use of special warrants without public debate, the failure to put meaningful consequences into the act -- then there is section 24 of the act. If all of those other things I've just mentioned give you doubt about the meaningfulness of this bill, consider section 24.
Section 24 is entitled: "Regulation making authority." Under
subsection (2) it says: "Without limiting subsection (1), the Lieutenant
Governor in Council" -- again, that is cabinet -- "may make
regulations as follows: (a) defining a word or expression used in this Act
[1030]
If, at any time, the government finds that some of these provisions are a little tough to deal with -- and notwithstanding the fact that they can't be prosecuted for violating the act, they might be concerned about adverse media coverage or public opinion -- the government can just go and change the meaning of any word contained in this act. I have never seen such a provision in any bill presented to this Legislature in the four years that I've been here. I look forward to getting some kind of a rational explanation from the government as to why they think that they should be able to say that up is down, balanced is unbalanced and deficits are surpluses.
Hon. Speaker, it reminds me a little bit of a book by George Orwell entitled 1984.
Remember that book? In George Orwell's depressing vision of the future, the
government would have ministries entitled the ministry of love
I fear that the real reason why the government has put in section 24 is so that they can do exactly the same thing. This, if taken to its extreme, would allow the government to label a deficit a surplus, to label a tax increase a tax decrease and to label unemployment a job. It's absolutely unbelievable that this government would think that they can get away with that and fool British Columbians, much less that they'd get support from the B.C. Liberal opposition. I for one am not going to support that provision.
This government has shown in the past a willingness to say that they've balanced the budget when in fact they were running a big deficit. In fact, they based a large part of their last election campaign on that misleading statement, and voters paid the price. To a large measure, because of that deceit imposed on British Columbians, we've been stuck with this government, which has continued to rack up the debt and
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has embarked on fast ferry fiascos to the tune of $465 million -- depriving patients of important health care around the province, including Prince George. My colleague next to me here is from Prince George-Omineca. All of us, for decades to come, will continue to pay the price for this government's negligence, wasteful spending and hostile investment policies, and all of that continues to be foisted on British Columbians because of the last election.
It would be nice to think that a few pages of paper could correct a government's basic philosophical bent towards deceit, dishonesty and incompetence. However, I don't think that's very realistic. Sadly, I have to conclude that the government is not going to change its spots overnight simply by passing Bill 2.
I'd have a bit more confidence if Bill 2 had some more teeth to it, if some of the provisions were more specific, if there wasn't as much wriggle room built into the statute. But the government has chosen not to do that. So much for a new era of openness; so much for a new style of government that the NDP tries to pretend is their government. It's anything but.
In order for any law to work, there has to be good intent on the part of the government to make it work. I don't think that this government really feels comfortable with the entire concept of transparency and openness. Just think back a few years to the ferries fiasco. The official opposition called for an audit early on in the construction process, to find out if we were really living within the budget as stated by the Premier and others in this Legislature. We had doubts. British Columbians had doubts, and people were expressing those doubts in the media. Yet this government refused to have an open accounting and auditing process, while the construction work was underway, to get to the bottom of the true costs of the project.
If that audit had been done at the time that the official opposition -- the B.C. Liberals and the member for Richmond Centre -- were asking for that audit, British Columbians could have been saved hundreds of millions of dollars. This government, in its arrogance, refused to listen to that request. They carried on racking up millions in wasteful expenditures, imposing those on British Columbians for generations to come. So much for being willing to be open and transparent and accountable.
[1035]
I've got a number of other examples here about this government's failure to be transparent and open that I'll share with you. In the Fraser Valley residents are appalled at the prospect of a fossil fuel-burning power plant being constructed just south of the border in Sumas, Washington. You would think that the B.C. government would be going to bat for its citizens in trying to fight an increase in air pollution, which is already pretty bad on summer days in the Fraser Valley. But you know what? I have had to go to the Washington State government in order to get my hands on copies of reports that were co-authored by the B.C. Ministry of Environment. The B.C. Ministry of Environment has not provided me with copies of any environmental impact assessments or studies that they have done with respect to this power plant. But they've given them to Washington State, and Washington State has forwarded them to me.
I don't understand what this government's hiding. Why aren't they out there advocating for residents in the Fraser Valley who are worried about their air quality? They're not. This government's been missing in action in this battle.
This government has consistently refused to share with us the cost of legal fees for defending various NDP MLAs in the courts. Goodness knows, the courts are choked up with legal proceedings against the NDP these days. I'm sure that the tab to taxpayers will be in the millions of dollars for all of the lawyers that have been hired to defend the NDP against one allegation or another. Yet this government refuses to share that information with the very taxpayers who are having to foot the bill.
We've had the Ministry of Environment attempt to impose streamside setback regulations on agricultural and rural communities across British Columbia. When I and my colleagues in the opposition have written to the Ministry of Environment for studies supporting those setback requirements, asking for the scientific studies that justify those actions and those restrictions on private property rights, we get nothing back. We get silence. The government refuses to share with us any information that would justify such draconian measures. Perhaps that's because they don't have the science to justify what they're doing. That's what I suspect.
Moving along, in recent weeks we've had some discussion through the media and here in the House regarding the Heritage Conservation Act. I notice that the Minister of Small Business is here. Last night he was asking me when I was going to raise this matter again in the House. Well, the government has identified over 20,000 sites in British Columbia that they feel contain some kind of historic or archaeological significance. Through the Heritage Conservation Act, private property owners are having their property seriously devalued as a result. Will the ministry come forward and tell us where those sites are? No. They're hiding that information from British Columbians, from private property owners, who are ultimately going to have to pay the price.
Hon. Speaker, I see that my time is almost concluded. But a couple more
examples of this government's failure include
Before sitting down, hon. Speaker, I'd like to welcome the member for Skeena to the House. It's a pleasure for me to see him here, and I know that all members of the House are pleased to see him back in the chamber.
The Speaker: Just before introducing the next speaker, if I may indulge and ask members to allow me to make an introduction.
Leave granted.
The Speaker: There are some 35 young people from a school in my constituency of Maple Ridge. They are the Haney-Pitt Meadows Christian School students. They're here with five adults, I believe, and their teacher, Mrs. Owen. I look forward to meeting with them shortly in the Speaker's office. Would members please welcome them.
Hon. U. Dosanjh: Hon. Speaker, before I make my remarks on this bill, which is very important, I want to welcome back into the House our colleague from Skeena. He's been engaged in a battle of his own, and we all wish him well. It's good to see him back in the House.
[1040]
This bill is about strengthening our commitment to keeping our government's finances open, honest and transparent. I
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know the opposition has been saying all kinds of things over the last few hours, and I've been listening and watching. But I said earlier this year: "The buck stops here." Not only is there greater prudence in our budgeting, but we now have this budget transparency legislation before the House. With this legislation we will have greater transparency in our financial reporting. British Columbians can see the choices we have made, see our spending priorities and see the complete bottom line. That's the intent of this legislation.
As you know, hon. Speaker, the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act was introduced with this year's budget. At the time, the Finance minister noted that it's a sweeping change in the way government and this Legislature would deal with public finances. It reflects and implements virtually all of the recommendations of the independent budget process review panel. I will comment on just a few of its measures.
The government will now be required by law to move to a three-to-five-year planning and budgeting horizon instead of the current one year. Longer-term goals will be laid out, including a longer-term view of the economy, by requiring the development of multi-year budget targets. The new law also opens the books on all major capital projects, fully disclosing their objectives, their business case, their performance targets and, each and every year, the current and anticipated project costs to the taxpayer. Now proponents of major Crown and government capital projects will have to clearly define their business case before their project gets the nod. Ministries and Crowns must also prepare performance plans with clearly defined strategic priorities and performance measures. Crown corporations will be required to provide the Minister of Finance with greater detail of their intentions, as their financial results now form part of the government's overall bottom line.
I believe the opposition will appreciate the act's requirement of more disclosure around special warrants. Our government is committed, wherever possible, to using supplementary estimates rather than special warrants. Although the latter commitment is not part of the act, it is one we're making to ensure fair and open debate should our government require additional funding before the end of the budget year. Beyond new disclosure and accountability requirements, this act sets a firm schedule for the budget process and for financial reporting throughout the year.
The throne speech summarized the goal of this act well: to give British Columbians the facts, all the facts and nothing but the facts. Yes, the opposition can quibble about the priorities. Certainly our priorities would always be different from this opposition, but they could not quibble about the figures. Only by living up to the letter of this new law can we restore British Columbians' confidence in the budget numbers and in the government's ability to manage the province in a planned, responsible fashion.
That rebuilding process has already begun. We prepared this year's budget as though the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act were already in place. That is why none of the members opposite have been able to question any of the figures in the current budget; we have already started working based on this law, as though this law was in effect.
I know hon. members opposite have been saying many things, but let me say this: I am committed to financial accountability and fiscal accountability on the part of the government. I am committed, over time, to balancing the budget. I am committed to bringing in the balanced budget law. But here is the difference. As someone said: "We support, as social democrats, a market economy, but what we don't support is what the opposition supports: a market society." That's the difference. And that's the difference we're going to take into the next campaign.
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What we require in British Columbia is a sense of economic dynamism. It exists. The high-tech sector is booming; film is booming. Last year the lumber earnings were $1 billion over the previous year. Exports went up by 12 percent over the previous year. Each and every sector of the economy is beginning to boom. The northeast sector of British Columbia is booming; oil and gas revenues were up $300 million over the previous year.
So the opposition is now worried that we have the economy on the rebound, that the economy is picking up, that we have the social priorities, the socially progressive agenda that British Columbians can relate to, and that we're going to win the next election. That's why you hear the howls on the opposite side.
Hon. Speaker, let me just conclude by saying that this is a law that's one in a series of measures that we're going to bring in to make sure that there is fiscal accountability on the part of the government. Books are open; people cannot question the figures. The opposition will always question our priorities, because those priorities on our part relate to the people's agenda.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Order, members.
Interjections.
The Speaker: Members, come to order, please.
The next speaker is the hon. member for West Vancouver-Garibaldi.
T. Nebbeling: I will not bother to respond to some of the statements made by the Premier in defence of the introduction of values of transparency and accountability, two values that I believe should have been part, from day one, of this government's agenda. They failed to do that. Now we see a futile attempt, at the very end of the second term, when the government has the right to call themselves government for maybe two or three more months, to come forward with a bill that shows a new commitment to how the financial management of this province will be dealt with in perpetuity by the guidelines that his government set.
I'm sure that the critic, who will speak later on for Finance, will have some good responses to some of the points that the minister made. In the meantime, I will focus on some of the ideas I have about what has happened in this province because of the lack of transparency and the lack of accountability by this government to the people of this province.
Before I get to that point, I should say that it is actually a good thing to see the Premier coming into the House to say a few words. Last night, when we debated this bill and had a number of our members on the floor, at no time was there one member opposite who dared to stand up and start to counter some of the arguments brought forward by us as to
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why the bill being introduced at this point is nothing more than a token effort by this government to -- I don't know -- maybe fool the public one more time or expect that the public will be fooled one more time, something that clearly will not happen.
Until the very end of the evening, there was no counter-response by the government members. At a quarter to nine last night the member for New Westminster felt compelled to say something, because after all, this bill is a very important bill for the government. This bill was actually introduced during the throne speech as a step that would be taken by this government. So it is not something that is just to be taken lightly. When a government, in a throne speech -- which is nothing more than the vision and the plan that they have for the province -- introduces a new bill that will set a new direction, we have to take it seriously.
A number of the members on this side made it clear that they were really surprised to see, first of all, very few members present -- but no response. So when the member for New Westminster stood up, I really expected to at least get some defence for what had been stated by the members on this side in their cynicism about what the Premier is doing with this bill. Rather than standing up and trying to defend the bill, the member went on a strange rant. He started out by saying: "Yes, we know that the NDP today, in the polls, is not higher than 16 percent. We also know that the Liberals are 52 percent or 58 percent. It is appalling to see how the Liberals are using the strength that they have mustered in this province to bully the government, to overpower the government." The member actually used the word "competence" -- that we use the competence in an arrogant way to fight what happens with this bill.
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If there had been anything else that this member could have forwarded to defend it, I would have accepted that little introduction. But that was it. That's what he talked about -- how appalled he was that we as an effective, competent opposition basically shredded this bill to pieces. I think he was trying to say: "You shouldn't do this, because your strength is such that we as a weak government, with 16 percent support of the province, shouldn't be attacked this way. It is not parliamentary." Well, it is very parliamentary. When something is wrong, we should have the right to call it wrong. When something has to be exposed as a farce, we have the right to expose it as a farce.
I'm happy to see the Premier here. I truly hope that today we're going to have some speakers from the other side who can shed some light on some of these issues that have been highlighted by the speakers earlier this morning and by the members last night.
In the meantime, I'd like to focus on, first of all, my regret to see a bill introduced that introduces values to this province, values of transparency and accountability. What really is, for me, something that I have difficulty coming to terms with is that indeed this government is arrogant enough to bring this bill in when it's only got a couple of months left to govern. When this government has been here for nine years and in these nine years did the financial management of this province without any requirement for accountability or any requirement for transparency, then you really have to wonder what motivated the Premier to introduce this bill.
I can only conclude that in these difficult times for the government, in these times that the government is coming to an end, he tried one more time what they tried to do in 1996 -- that is, fool the people of this province. They did it in 1996 successfully. But the one thing I can guarantee the government is that they will never, ever do it again -- not in the year 2000 or in the years to come -- because the government has been identified for what it is. It's been identified as people who don't tell the truth. They have been identified as a government that has been involved in projects that didn't tell the public -- who ultimately are the people who pay the bill -- what indeed the cost was of this project. And because of all the costs this government has loaded onto their special projects, other areas have tremendously suffered.
We heard colleagues of mine speak last night about the lack of proper hospital care. We heard members speak last night about the medical situation in the north, where doctors don't want to go, where nurses can't operate. Why is there no funding available to pay these doctors a proper fee? Nurses are not willing to go there, because they are supposed to work for seven days a week, 24 hours a day, with no time off. If they need time off, they have to find somebody to replace them, for which they have to pay them. We have a disaster as far as health care in the north is concerned. And it is only a disaster because this government has wasted hundreds if not billions of dollars over the last nine years, money that should have gone towards health care.
When we look at the hospitals in the lower mainland, we see the lineups in emergency wards, and we see doctors working continuously for 20 to 24 hours. We see patients being accommodated in emergency wards in the most horrendous ways -- people lying on gurneys in walkways. They're in cupboards. It's only because the lack of funding doesn't allow these emergency wards to provide the service they should be providing. Again, why is there a lack of funding? Well, because this government has spent billions of dollars on fast ferries, on Skeena Cellulose, on unwarranted business grants. This government has had the priority that had nothing to do with the welfare of British Columbians, and that's why so many people suffer when they go to hospitals.
How many people are walking around today full of pain because they need a hip operation and have to wait for a year? How many people are walking around this province with a time bomb, not knowing if the cancer that has been identified there or the medical problem that could be cancerous is truly cancerous or not and are on a waiting list of ten weeks, three months, six months? Can you imagine walking around with the message: "There's something wrong with you. We think it could be a cancer, but we can't give you the final decision until we do a second test. But you will not be able to get the second test for at least three to six months"? Isn't it unbelievable that that is what this government is doing in the name of the men and women of this province? And then they call themselves the party with the social conscience. I think they should be ashamed to even be considered as a socially conscious group of people.
[1055]
Mr. Speaker, it is horrible, but there are other people who have suffered. It's an all-different group, and I'm going to talk a little bit about them as well.
I as the critic of Municipal Affairs have seen firsthand the erosion that municipalities, cities and towns have had to experience because this government took away the funding that traditionally was coming to towns to provide the infrastructure for the communities. The UBCM, Union of B.C. Munici-
[ Page 16233 ]
palities, did a study last year. They identified that $800 million had been taken away from the communities in British Columbia, which should have been paid to them in grants for funding of water, sewer, roads, bridges, public safety facilities. When the government broke their promise -- and they did break their promise -- and suddenly cut off communities from these funds that it traditionally was their right to have, their communities were forced -- because they still had to provide the services -- to go back to their taxpayers and start adding more cost to the tax base. Obviously the tax base could not accommodate another $800 million, so the second choice communities had to make was to cut services.
I don't know if the Premier has ever been involved with local government, but
local government is not only there to police and to provide road services. They
are also part of keeping the structure and the community together, and many
community organizations that are involved in bringing some quality of life to
communities rely on funding from the local government. Most of these
communities, who traditionally were given some financial support in order to
provide community services
So there is a very serious erosion of quality of community living. How many libraries have been underfunded? I checked in my own riding, and I know that in every community in my riding, every library, again, was cut short of funds -- not that the community wanted it. The funds are just not available, because the government has taken so much back from what it was supposed to pay to honour the commitments it made in the past.
I talk about transparency, and I talk about accountability as values that should have been introduced in 1990-91 when this government came into power, because that would have avoided indeed fast ferry programs. It would have avoided these horrible grants that have been given out by this government to friends and insiders. Skeena Cellulose is a good example -- $379 million.
The transit system. Most likely right now we're looking at a $2.8 billion bill. Everybody who is involved is saying: "Oh man, this is never going to be done for $2.8 billion." But again, because there is no transparency and there is no accountability, the project is on its way and can't be stopped. And we don't know how much it is going to cost. These kinds of projects would never, ever have been given the green light if this government would have been, by law, forced to be honest with the people of British Columbia about how they spend their money. That is the question that people ask: where is all that money going? So I just gave a couple of examples, Mr. Speaker.
[1100]
The member for Chilliwack this morning went quite rigorously through the bill and identified a number of problems that can only be rectified if indeed we will have some amendments introduced to the House, and I know that the critic will introduce some amendments. I hope that the government is truly committed, as late as it is, to introduce these new values into how the province will operate in the future. We, as the government, are willing to live with the new rules. We introduced the new rules in 1995 and 1996 as a private member's bill by the Leader of the Opposition. They were laughed at; they were rejected. Now, suddenly they're adopted as the brainchild of the government. But having said all that, we are committed to being accountable.
We are committed to be transparent in all we do when it comes to the financial management of this government. It's my hope that the members opposite will look at the amendments and that they will accept these amendments. By doing that, we will make this document a little bit better, not just for ourselves but for the people living in the province of British Columbia.
[T. Stevenson in the chair.]
G. Plant: I seek leave to make an introduction, Mr. Speaker.
Leave granted.
G. Plant: Present in the galley seated behind me now, I think, are some students from W.D. Ferris Elementary School -- some grade 6 and 7 students who go to school at an elementary school in the Richmond-Steveston constituency. They're here with their teacher, Mr. Allison, and some adults. They all had some very good questions about what we're doing here, and I'm sure they'll be following the debate with interest. I'd ask all members of the House to please extend a very generous and warm welcome to them.
R. Neufeld: I rise to speak briefly to the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act as it's presented to the House today. I hope I'll be able to carry the debate a little longer than the five minutes that the Premier just exercised here in the House on a bill that the Premier called the centrepiece of the throne speech.
When Premiers stand up in this Legislature -- and I've seen a few -- and start talking about centrepieces to their legislation, start talking about directions and visions or supposed visions that they have for the province, they generally can speak with a bit of passion, a bit of desire, and really show the public that they believe in what they're saying. That's generally what I've become accustomed to. As I say, I have not always and will not always agree with the way that Premiers past and this present Premier have put forward some of their ideas and visions for the province of British Columbia.
I was very disappointed, to say the least, that the Premier would gather around him the five or six people he wanted sitting on each side and behind him to show that there was support for his Budget Transparency and Accountability Act and that he would stand and deliver a speech on it of about five minutes in length. Two and half minutes of that was attacking the official opposition. That demonstrates to me the shallowness, the absolute non-desire and contempt that this group has for anything that relates to budget transparency and accountability.
Why should we, in any estimation, sit in this House and believe that any member from the present governing party believes in any of these issues either?
An Hon. Member: You're not being very cooperative.
[1105]
R. Neufeld: My colleague says I'm not being very cooperative, and I don't intend to be very cooperative.
[ Page 16234 ]
It's actually a bit tough for me to take. I've listened to the Leader of the Opposition for as many years as he has been in this House -- from 1993 forward -- talk about truth in budgeting and not just give it lip service and not just give it a two-minute run on the floor of the Legislature -- but constantly. Year after year after year he brings it forward, puts it before this House, puts it before the present government and asks them to accept it.
You know, why I find it a bit odd that this government would now present this kind of bill is that when the Leader of the Opposition would do that, the present government would laugh at him and point fingers. Many of them would say: "Balance -- you can't have balanced budgets, or you're going to destroy the province. You're not going to be able to provide the social programs."
Every year we stand in this House. We debate budgets, and we've debated nine
of them with this group here -- each and every one of them a deficit. When the
second-past Premier, the member for Vancouver
An Hon. Member: Kingsway.
R. Neufeld: The member for Vancouver-Kingsway used to talk about the problems in balancing the budgets and couldn't provide the social programs if we went out and did those kind of things. No, it's just not on for a socialist government. And in the dying days -- I'm only guessing; I don't know -- of the last session that we'll have in this House with this government before an election is called, to bring forward a bill called the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act is just a little bit too hard for anyone to take, understand or accept.
When we see -- with the fever that the Premier stood up, the commitment, the desire, the will, and from the heart spoke for five minutes from notes on his desk prepared by someone else -- that he wasn't even sure what he was reading about, it becomes just a little bit harder to take.
You know, yesterday, when we started debate on this bill
Interjection.
R. Neufeld: Last evening.
Hon. I. Waddell: It's new -- too new for you.
R. Neufeld: The Minister of Small Business talks about: "This is a new government." This is no new government. It's the same old group; it's the same old crowd. It's the same folks who couldn't tell the truth back last year, the year before and the year before that -- since 1991 forward, I guess I should say, hon. Speaker. They couldn't tell the truth then, and there's no need to believe for one moment that this bill would change that minister or that government into being accountable and having budget transparency. It's just a bit too much to take.
We've stood, and I have, in this House since 1991 -- 1992 was the first session -- and listened to this government blame everyone else, point fingers at everyone else for all the problems in the province of British Columbia and continue to do that and bring forward budget after budget that wasn't transparent and budget after budget that was in a deficit position.
[1110]
I can remember standing here and saying, "You know, at some point in time" -- even with the economy back then going pretty good -- "you have to balance the budget if you're going to continue to provide social programs, if you're going to be able to continue to provide health care and if you're going to be able to continue to provide education and social services for those that need help in our society. But at some point in time, you have to balance the budget, and you have to get your fiscal house in order." And this group laughed every time. They always acted as though they knew better. I've become accustomed that when I hear a socialist talk in this House, they always know better about everything.
Here we are in the ninth year of this sorry administration, and they bring forward Bill 2, Budget Transparency and Accountability Act. The Premier can't even spend more than two minutes talking about the attributes of it, because there are few.
I will stand up and vote for this bill. I will stand up and vote for this bill and plug my nose, because it's a start -- only a start. But there is a group of amendments that we intend to put forward as the official opposition, which will actually change this bill and make it really transparent, will make it really accountable. Those amendments will be put forward by our House Leader and critic when we debate committee stage.
I hope the Premier is in the House to be able to stand up and say: "Yes, that's a good idea. We didn't listen to you for nine years. We haven't listened to you for all those years that you've put forward a truth-in-budgeting act. So yes, we can agree to some of these amendments. Yes, we will incorporate them into our Budget Transparency and Accountability Act, and it will make it better. It will make it tougher, and it will make it real."
I hope that the Finance minister and the Premier of the day are here at that
time to accept that. And I hope that each and every member from across the way,
even though there are some who don't believe in balanced budgets
An Hon. Member: Most of them.
R. Neufeld: In fact, I guess you could almost say all of them. Probably the only one who's trying to make out that he's believing in balanced budgets is the fellow that is the Premier today, who went out to score some points at a party meeting and talked about balanced budgets before consulting with his own caucus. This is the group that talks about consulting with British Columbians.
An Hon. Member: A new style of government.
R. Neufeld: This is the new government, the new Premier who forgot to talk to his cabinet before he went out to a meeting in Prince George or in the Okanagan or someplace -- Kamloops -- and talked about balanced-budget legislation. What a new government! It's so great. It's so new that the Premier could only spend two minutes on it -- absolutely unbelievable. I would almost think that the Premier should be able to come in this House and rattle off two hours. In fact, the Minister of Finance should be able to give him his time. He should be able to rattle off two hours about how this is the shining part or the centrepiece of the throne speech: "The centrepiece of where I want to take my new government."
[ Page 16235 ]
Well, I guess we know what "new" is. It fell flat on its face, and it's broken, and it's falling apart. There's nothing new about this group at all, nothing new other than that it's another day.
I was also interested to listen to the Minister of Finance yesterday when he gave his ten-minute discussion about this new bill from a new government. A couple of things that the Finance minister talked about I was quite interested in. I wrote as quickly as I could, and I haven't read the Blues this morning so I won't quote. He said things like: "It will be the first time it will be law on how budgets are designed."
[1115]
Now, how did we get there? How did we get there -- that this group all of a sudden decides that it has to have a law in this House on how budgets are designed? Would it be because they feel a little bit bad? Do they feel a bit remorseful about how they have concocted and put together the past nine budgets for the province of British Columbia? Do you think they're feeling a bit remorseful about not telling the people the truth? Do you think they're feeling a bit remorseful about 1995 and 1996, telling the people in British Columbia one of the biggest untruths we've heard for a long time -- that there were two balanced budgets? They were not, and they knew it.
You know, it's one thing to say you've got a balanced budget and, from the
time you say it until you present it, some catastrophe takes place, and you
actually don't have a balanced budget. People will understand that; they'll
accept that as an unforeseen, and the government didn't really know. But you
know, hon. Speaker, when we go back and look at how this group of socialists put
together their budgets, when today, a number of years later, we actually see how
the auditor general dealt with the issue in assessing those two fudge-it
budgets, and we see the notes that come from Treasury Board, that -- not now --
came to that government, came to that Finance minister, came to that Premier of
the day, came to that cabinet, in fact came to the whole caucus and said,
"There is no way that you can balance the budget without something
absolutely unbelievable happening in the province of British Columbia
And guess what this group did. They said, "We know better than Treasury Board; we know better than anyone else; we know better than the people of the province of British Columbia. You know what we're going to do? We're going to underestimate our expenditures, and we're going to overestimate our revenue. We're going to have two balanced budgets, and we're going to run an election on that," even though Treasury Board says things in 1995 like: "Red ink is rising. Direct debt is likely in 1996-97 and 1997-98 without a revenue miracle," as they call it. These are notes from Treasury Board to this cabinet and to this caucus about the problems that British Columbia was facing.
But guess what. This group saw their way clear to say: "We balanced the budget, and, British Columbians, we deserve another term." And guess what: British Columbians bought into it, unfortunately. They bought into it. They put in a government that's inept, dishonest and not doing the things that the people of the province of British Columbia wanted them to do for a second term, unfortunately.
And let me tell you, we're going to be a long time climbing out of that hole.
The Minister of Small Business sits over there and says: "Ho, ho, ho
Hon. I. Waddell: It's all nonsense.
R. Neufeld: "
I'll tell you, Mr. Speaker, that's why I just have a hard time -- when I say that I'm going to hold my nose, I'm going to hold my nose -- thinking about voting for an NDP government that talks about budget transparency and accountability. It's just too much to take. I mean, every indication was given to this government. They ignored every opportunity they had to deal with the people of British Columbia fairly and honestly. They ignored it.
[1120]
There are actually so many notes from Ministry of Finance officials and from Treasury Board to this government at the time when they put in the fudge-it budgets that there's just too many to read into the record. The NDP know; the socialists know. The whole works of them were briefed on it. Inner people in cabinet knew full well that they weren't telling the truth; cabinet knew they weren't telling the truth. And yet they went ahead. Do you think for a minute, Mr. Speaker, that because today or tomorrow or the next day, or whenever it is, we're going to pass a bill put forward by this same group of socialists that chose to not tell the truth and chose to mislead the province of British Columbia about balanced budgets, we're really going to believe that they're going to do it today? I don't know how gullible they think people are. How gullible do they think people in British Columbia are?
A second thing I noted in the Minister of Finance's short discussion in his
centrepiece was that there will be an all-party committee that will go around
the province and listen to people. That's a first, I guess, because up until now
it's always been the minister or some NDP backbenchers that went around and
listened to British Columbians and brought forward their own interpretation. So
it will be interesting to see how that's dealt with. But the second thing the
minister said
I mean, it's just beyond me to think and remember all the times I sat in this House and listened to Finance minister after Finance minister tell us that this is what British Columbians want and this is what we're doing. And then the present Finance minister said yesterday -- in fact, as short a time ago as last night -- that it'll be the first time we're going to listen to British Columbians' interests. That's probably true. This government has not listened to the people of British Columbia ever since they were elected. They always rode that little horse across the field, and like the sign says: "When you cross the grass, make sure you're three feet above it."
That exactly how this group has worked. For the number of years it's been in government, it's been bloody pathetic. I've listened to it; I've watched it. I've seen the result, and the result has not always been good. They've destroyed the trust that people in this province have in this Legislature and in their elected politicians.
[ Page 16236 ]
Sometimes you've got to tell the truth. Sometimes you've got to stand out there and tell people exactly what you're thinking and how you're going to do it. That's one thing that this government has always had difficulty doing. It's absolutely astounding to me that this government, this supposed new government, this same old group would come forward and talk today, in the last year of their mandate, about a budget transparency and accountability act -- absolutely unbelievable.
[1125]
You know, Mr. Speaker, last night when we started speaking on this, there was no intention on the government's part to have any speakers. I think the opposition had three or four before one finally stood up on the other side and defended it as best as he could. It was something they didn't want to do. In fact, the Premier had no idea he was going to walk in here today and defend this lousy little budget transparency act until about ten minutes before he walked in the House. All of a sudden they realized that the opposition was speaking towards some of the things in this bill that aren't going to work, and many members have put forward parts of the bill that won't work.
The Premier said, in his short two-minute address, that Crown corporations will now have to report and government will have to report major capital projects and plans and have annual reports and performance plans. But if you go to section 24 of the bill, it negates all that. So why don't you just stand up and tell the truth for a change? Why doesn't the Premier just stand up and say: "Well, we want Crowns and we want government organizations to present annual reports. But maybe we don't want them to, so we've put a section in the bill to allow us to wiggle out of that." Section 24 allows this government to wiggle out of all of those things.
I'll read it into the record, because the Premier was afraid to put it in the
record, and I haven't heard one of the government members talk about it yet or
defend it or say: "Hey, this is in here for this kind of a reason."
Not even the Minister of Finance would talk about it. I won't read it all, but
section 24 (2)(b) says: "
Don't give me this wishy-washy stuff that you're all of a sudden going to have governments and Crowns and all parts of government identities putting forward all these plans, because it's not the truth. You give yourself some wiggle room. This is a document at the dying days of a government that think they can come and pull the wool over the eyes of the people of British Columbia. I'll tell you, Mr. Speaker, they won't even begin to do that. The people of British Columbia have been misled so many times by this government that it wouldn't matter what they did. They're not going to vote for them.
In fact, I was just given a document, and I often refer to it because it's quite interesting. It's called: "New Democrat Fiscal Framework: The Five-Year Balanced Budget Plan," presented by Mike Harcourt, September 20, 1991. That was just at the time the election was called in 1991. It's a number of years ago. It talks about the previous government -- how terrible it was -- and how the New Democrats, the socialists, were going to bring fiscal balanced budgets within five years.
Well as I add, 1991 till now, you passed the mark. It went right by -- the five-year time. That should have been 1996. Oh, 1996. Was that when this government told people they had a balanced budget -- actually misled people about having a balanced budget? Was that about the time when they told people that they had a balanced budget, but they weren't even close? And they knew it, Mr. Speaker. They knew it from the documentation that had been provided to them by Treasury Board, by their own staff. The cabinet knew it. Many of the same people are still in cabinet today -- not many new faces. I guess that's what they were doing. At that time, maybe they were just living up to Mike Harcourt's five-year balanced budget plan. They thought: "My goodness" -- I guess, as committed as they are to socialism -- "Mike said it in 1991, and we're going to say by 1996 that we've got a balanced budget, whether we know it or not."
[1130]
It's no wonder I come a bit hesitant, a bit unsure, about whether I should even vote for this bill or not. I can't for the life of me believe that any one of those folks across the way really believes in what they're telling us. This government has been told time and time again that they have to get their fiscal house in order and that they have to start telling people the truth. And in the dying days of their administration, after nine years of being told that, they wake up. They say: "Yeah, maybe we have to start, and maybe we'll just try and tell people today that we're starting up, that we're new, that we're new people, and 'I'm sorry for all those years of neglect. I'm sorry for all those years of not really keeping the interests of British Columbians at heart. I'm sorry for presenting all those deficit budgets. I'm sorry for having fast ferries and not telling people the truth about the expenditure on fast ferries.' "
You know, this government has failed on so many things -- and has been less than honest, to put it in parliamentary language -- with the people of the province of British Columbia that I don't think for a minute, for one small minute, that anyone other than the few committed socialists that are in the province will believe that this government is really serious about budget transparency and accountability. I fit in there, where I don't believe for one minute that this government believes anything or is committed to anything in this bill. So I'll be interested, Mr. Speaker, if you accept our changes to the bill, and we'll go from there. Thank you very much. I enjoyed the time to speak to this bill.
Hon. I. Waddell: I'm very pleased to get up today and speak on Bill 2, the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act. I must say, after sitting here listening to the opposition speaking this morning, that I'm puzzled. They say the bill's okay.
Interjection.
Hon. I. Waddell: I'm puzzled; the bill's all right but
You know, they criticize the Premier for coming into the House and speaking
and giving
Interjection.
[ Page 16237 ]
Hon. I. Waddell: Yeah, he gives a short speech, to the point, not
heavy with rhetoric like the hon. member for Prince George-Omineca who just
spoke last. He addressed the bill
A Voice: Peace River.
Hon. I. Waddell: I'm sorry -- the hon. member for Peace River North, who last spoke.
The Premier came in, addressed the bill, gave a speech that was part of a new style, it seems to me, of governing, and that is to address a problem directly and to come up with a solution.
You know, I was listening to the hon. members this last debate, and the hon. member for Richmond-Steveston is there. He made an interjection on his own colleague about being cooperative. The hon. member for Peace River North said, and I think I've got the quote right: "My colleague says I'm not being very cooperative, and I don't intend to be very cooperative."
Well, this seems to be the style of the opposition -- that they're incapable of being positive. They're incapable of saying, "Look, here's a bill that we can really support and that we welcome," and that the government's moving in the right direction and that this is the new trend in politics. You know, they could have said that. But no, they stick to the old style -- what I consider the old style of politics.
[1135]
I was talking yesterday to a friend of mine who's working in international relations for the Canadian government. He had a chance, through his job, to visit different parts of the world in very quick succession, different cities in Japan, South America and Europe. He's been around. He was telling me -- and I agree with him -- that there's kind of a new opinion in the world, a new relationship about to be born or being born between governments and their citizens. The citizens want to be informed, and they want to participate. And they don't want -- which the opposition offers, basically -- the neoconservative position. That is, kind of, government's out of your face. You just give dramatic tax breaks to rich guys, and then you don't govern very much.
This is not what people in the world want. They want the government to
govern. I don't apologize for the fact that this government, in the last few
years
An Hon. Member: You did it?
Hon. I. Waddell: No, I didn't do it. The hon. members did. But I helped with government policy to do it, and it was a priority to do it. The people did it. The people did it, but they had cooperation between government and the private sector.
That's the kind of new method of governing. That's what the people want. They
want the government to govern. But they want the government to govern in a
responsible, transparent and open way. That's what this bill does. This is part
of the new
But that's the old style. Let me move to what I think
We lost that after the war. We had been leaders in the world. The government led by the hon. member for Vancouver-Kingsway got into that and indeed trained a lot of very good workers who are working on other projects all around the lower mainland of Vancouver right now. That was part of the spinoff from the fast ferries. We know it would have taken years -- in fact, what Norway and Sweden and the other countries went through -- to work out the kinks in these things and to sell them worldwide.
Yes, there will be criticism there on that. You'll notice that the government of the new Premier has dealt with this criticism, has moved to an open and transparent way of governing. It's a government that will listen to people and a government that tries to represent all segments of society. I tell you, I get concerned when I hear the Leader of the Opposition. I heard him on the radio, and I read in the Blues yesterday about his performance in the other committee of the House. There's another committee going on here, as you know, and as we speak now, dealing with the estimates of the Ministry of Social Development.
[1140]
In that, she was discussing yesterday about child care. You know, the Leader
of the Opposition was in there with his colleagues, and they were saying:
"No. Dramatic tax cuts will create jobs, and that's where we're
going." Well, as a matter of fact, we have an 18-year low in unemployment.
We have one of the best employment records now. We've had an 18-year low. The
Liberal position on the day care matter was that they didn't believe that there
should be universal child care at $7, to start with. It would cost the family
Again, let me just deal with some provisions to this bill, because I think it
reflects what my friend was saying when he travelled the world. The new method
of governing between the government and its citizens
[ Page 16238 ]
Now, here's the first step in this bill. You will recall that the Finance minister noted that it is a sweeping change in the way government and the Legislature deals with public finances. It reflects and implements virtually all of the recommendations of an independent budget process review panel. I think that was the Enns group. There was an independent panel that made the recommendations, and this government has adopted those recommendations. For example, the government will be required by this law to move to a three-to-five-year planning and budgeting horizon. That's different from the one-year. So you get forward planning. This will require us to consider not only our longer-term goals but also the longer-term view of the economy.
Right now, this economy has just gone through an excruciatingly difficult period of adjusting from basically an export of raw materials economy to a new knowledge economy. We are moving into the new-knowledge economy. That's why areas like high-tech, film and tourism are booming in this province.
An Hon. Member: Microsoft is not coming.
Hon. I. Waddell: I don't know about Microsoft coming. The funny thing about the rumours, as the hon. member mentions about Microsoft coming, is that people say: "You know, it would be possible. It's not a bad place to come to. This is a place to come to."
After all, it's one of the most beautiful places to live. Almost 12 percent
of our land is in parks, which this government has done through great opposition
from the opposition. This is a good place to be. This is a kinder, gentler
society
Interjections.
Hon. I. Waddell: Yeah, it is. And it's part of the Canadian and
British Columbian tradition. That's why I believe that this government, and this
Premier particularly, is reflecting that. You know, the hon. members get up, and
they're pretty confident. Reminds me of when I was a little boy and my dad used
to tell me bedtime stories about the hare and the turtle. Do you recall that,
hon. Speaker? You know, the hare was the rabbit. The rabbit was pretty
Interjections.
Hon. I. Waddell: Well, I'll tell the hon. member the story. The rabbit
was pretty confident. The rabbit thought he would win the race, and the rabbit
was just telling everybody
Interjections.
Hon. I. Waddell: The tortoise took its time; the tortoise got its legislation in order. It got the kind of things that I would say people wanted. And you know what? You know who won the race? So the hon. members opposite who are yelling and yelping because it hits home with them should not be overconfident.
This bill deals with Crown corporations, it deals with ministries, it deals with disclosure around special warrants. It deals with a firm schedule for budget process and financial reporting throughout the year.
An Hon. Member: It doesn't deal with honesty.
Hon. I. Waddell: Well, this is an honest bill. I invite the member to look. This is a bill that's straightforward and, as I said, is what people want.
You know, the other thing that the members should consider
Interjections.
The Speaker: Members, just a moment please.
[1145]
Interjections.
The Speaker: Members, please. Please have the courtesy to listen to the ministers as they have listened to you.
Hon. I. Waddell: The members are very sensitive when I mention
Walkerton, and the reason is
Interjection.
Hon. I. Waddell: Yeah, people died. The reason is that the Harris
government, in this kind of conservative policy advocated by the people
opposite, cut back dramatically on government and services. And suddenly the
light is going on for people. The light is going on that some of the
ramifications for the dramatic tax decreases
Interjections.
The Speaker: Members, please. You have had the opportunity to say what you wished when you were speaking, members. So does the minister.
Hon. I. Waddell: The members opposite don't like it, because it
strikes home and, well, it reflects the future policies of this government,
which
Interjections.
Hon. I. Waddell: Well, let me suggest to the hon. members where the new electorate will go, because I started on that. I said that this bill was part of where people want to go. I think people are looking for a different kind of society in British Columbia. This is part of it here; this is one part of it. This is the part of making government budgetary process open and accountable.
I think they want to go to other places as well. I think people want to make B.C. the best place in the country for education. We've taken those steps openly and honestly. We have in fact frozen tuition fees, we've increased expenditures in education, we have built new universities, we've built post-secondary institutions for kids, for families to send their kids on to get an education to be part of the new economy.
[ Page 16239 ]
The new economy is here. It's in high-tech, it's in film, it's in value-added forestry. I was in Nelson last week at the Festival of the Arts, and you can see how a town has developed around a new economy. That's part of our vision. That's what we're trying to do in this province.
We also want to see communities have some real power; that is, we want to strengthen the communities. I could see with the Columbia Basin Trust in the Kootenays a role model of how that had been done. We want a greener society. We want to encourage, through the taxation system and through other ways, the new green industry. We're going to be the first jurisdiction in the world to have 12 percent of our land in protected areas. It was a struggle to do it, but it's being done.
We want a society that's good for the worker -- fair labour laws. And you can see it in British Columbia. Nobody is ignored. We look after, through a high minimum wage, even the lowest worker entering our society.
We need equality for women in society. There's not sufficient equality now, if you look at the wage differentials. You know, in the next ten years women will be 60 percent of the workforce. That's an area that we alone in British Columbia, are committed to. Not the Liberals, not the Green Party, not the Reform Party, but the NDP is committed to equality for women, and our record shows it.
We want to secure medicare and health, and we think we can do it, because we founded medicare. And by God, we're not going to let it die; we're not going to go to a two-tier system of medicare. We're going to have a universal system that preserves the rights of ordinary people, and people see that.
And we're moving to put the financial house in order. I think that's a pretty darn good program, and that's what the hon. member spoke of. You know, I was elected on a program like that, and I believe I could be elected again on a program like that.
So I say to the hon. members: don't be so sensitive and so overconfident. Watch what the government's doing. Listen. Listen to what the people want. They don't want dramatic tax increases for the top couple of percent of society. They want a fair society. They want a society that's committed to justice for the ordinary family and for the future of their kids.
[1150]
This bill is a first step. There'll be more steps coming. I invite the hon. members opposite to be positive and to get up and vote for this bill.
Seeing the time, I move that this debate be now adjourned.
Motion approved.
Committee of Supply A, having reported progress, was granted leave to sit again.
Hon. I. Waddell moved adjournment of the House.
Motion approved.
The House adjourned at 11:51 a.m.
The House in Committee of Supply A; D. Streifel in the chair.
The committee met at 10:16 a.m.
ESTIMATES: MINISTRY OF SOCIAL
DEVELOPMENT AND ECONOMIC SECURITY
(continued)
On vote 45: ministry operations, $2,026,375,000 (continued).
K. Whittred: If I can, this morning I would like to try to get just a few more details about the plan for the child care program. Yesterday, I believe that the minister gave me some numbers. One of these, I think, was that there are approximately 19,000 children presently in licensed care -- or was that in before- and after-school licensed care?
Hon. J. Pullinger: That's licensed group before- and after-school care.
K. Whittred: I just want to make sure that I'm clear now. When we're talking about the plan for next January, we're talking about those 19,000 children?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We're talking about those 19,000 spaces. We're also talking about a modest expansion: approximately 2,000 to 3,000 spaces on top of that.
K. Whittred: I wonder if the minister could tell me the geographic distribution of those spaces -- the existing 19,000 spaces. Do they tend to exist in urban areas? Do they tend to exist in Kelowna? Do they tend to exist on the North Shore? In other words, how are these spaces distributed?
Hon. J. Pullinger: They tend to exist where the kids are. They follow the demographic trends. Where there's a large number of six-to-12-year-olds, you'll tend to find those spaces.
K. Whittred: In preparing the plan for this program, surely the ministry must have a breakdown of where these spaces currently exist. For example, if I were to ask how many before- and after-school licensed care facilities or spaces there are on the North Shore, does the minister have that information available?
Hon. J. Pullinger: Yes, of course we have that database, but I don't have that level of detail here. I'd be happy to provide it to the member, if she so desires.
K. Whittred: Actually, I would be very interested in seeing the distribution of the existing spaces.
I also wanted to ask the minister where the geographic distribution is apt to come. In other words, what is the ministry projecting? I'm assuming we should be well into the planning process; there's only six months to go before implementation. The ministry is promising 2,000 to 3,000 additional spaces, which is a fairly vague and broad number. Where does the ministry anticipate that these spaces will be?
[ Page 16240 ]
[1020]
Hon. J. Pullinger: First of all, let me be clear that there are a lot of decisions yet to be made by the implementation team. Those decisions will affect the ultimate shape of the program. That's why there's a range of new spaces, because how much is available for new spaces will depend on some of the decisions that the team makes. That's point number one.
Point number two is that the new spaces, like the existing spaces, will be driven and created by community, based on need. I have one clear bias that, from my first meeting with the implementation team, I think it's fair to say is shared unanimously: that any new spaces must go where there is need. That is both in terms of no existing child care, or grossly inadequate amounts of child care for the population, but also where there is economic need. That's the priority for me, and that's immutable.
K. Whittred: The minister has raised an issue about economic need. I'm wondering what factors are factored into that equation, in terms of determining need.
Hon. J. Pullinger: Well, in my riding I know precisely which parts of
my riding tend to be lower-income and which parts of my riding are
higher-income, and I know which schools within that part of the community are
lower-income. I'm sure that every member in this Legislature knows the same
thing about their riding, and certainly every community
For instance, there are parts of every community that are lower-income than
others, and people know where that is. This is community-driven, and so I would
ask the communities to come forward and demonstrate that any new spaces
K. Whittred: Now, the minister has mentioned several times the implementation team. I wonder: perhaps this is a good time to ask about who is on this team and how they got to be on this team.
Hon. J. Pullinger: I will be happy to forward the member a list of the names. That's public information.
The team was created, obviously, on a model that I asked staff to do, and that is to be as inclusive as possible, to make sure that as broad a range of interests as possible are at the table. So for instance, the principal of the school where we announced it yesterday -- Jamieson School -- is on the team. We have the chair of the Provincial Child Care Council, who wears many hats and has significant expertise in this area, on the team. We have parents' groups on the team. We have labour on the team. The child care forum has sent a group of representatives to the team, etc.
These are individuals who represent a constituency and, in most cases, are very connected to a constituency and represent the broad range of interests that we need to make sure that we do this right -- including some regional representation.
K. Whittred: I will look forward to learning of the individuals. I
think I know some of them who are on the team, but learning who all of the
individuals are
One of the concerns that I have had from the beginning about this particular
program has been what I foresaw as a lack of a plan, a lack of planning, and the
sort of ad hoc nature of the announcement. I wonder, if we still have not seen a
plan
[1025]
Hon. J. Pullinger: First, let me correct the record. I'm advised by my deputy, who gave the briefing, that she didn't say that there was no plan. She said that it was not possible to release the plan, because it had not yet gone to cabinet.
This is under development. You cannot sit here in Victoria and develop a
comprehensive, complete, every-detail plan and also do it with the community. So
we have put the broad-brush strokes
My preference is to
K. Whittred: One of the other little bits of the puzzle that has sort of bothered me, I guess, from the beginning of the announcement about this is that there is an abundance of literature -- and the minister is well aware of all of this literature -- around the importance of early childhood education. I don't mind sharing with you, hon. Chair, that it was a great disappointment to me when the ministry decided to embark on a part of this endeavour, that they started with what was probably, in my opinion at least, not the most important part of the puzzle that constitutes all of the early childhood package.
I would ask the minister what factors entered into the decision that they would go with the before- and after-school care, which is probably -- at least in the discussions I've had -- the least demanded. What I hear in the community is a demand for infant and toddler care that is almost of crisis proportions. The second part of that, of course, is the abundance of dialogue in the community about the early childhood component. I would like the minister to tell me why they chose the particular part of the puzzle that they did.
Hon. J. Pullinger: I have to confess that I'm struggling a bit, because the B.C. Liberals have made it very clear that they
[ Page 16241 ]
wouldn't do child care at all. However, I'm certainly happy to explain to them why we're doing the piece that we're doing.
The reason that we're doing grade 1 to 12-year-olds is because we have
determined, based on a very intense look at the whole infant-to-12-year-old
piece and the needs, that this a piece that is doable. We want to make sure that
the first step
We are again carving new ground, as we've done with B.C. Benefits, as we've done with the family bonus and so many other things that have worked so very well in this province. We're carving out new ground here, and therefore there's agreement with the child care community and everybody that what we need to do is take the most manageable piece and design the system around that. We're not dealing with the most difficult expensive piece at the same time we're trying to design the system. We are designing the system on a piece that we feel very confident that we can do, and do within the budget limitations that we have. That's what grade 1 to 12-year-olds is. It's a manageable piece that we can do and get up and running by January 1 and make sure that the foundation of this new service, this new program, is solid indeed.
[1030]
K. Whittred: I thank the minister for acknowledging that this piece of the child care puzzle is, in fact, the least expensive and probably the simplest to implement of all the various parts of the child care package. That is what I like to call it, because I don't see it as one thing. We like to think that we can think outside the box and that there are a whole bunch of things that go into providing and supporting families.
Now, I wanted to query the minister a little bit. I think yesterday the minister said that on the cost of this, at some point some families will pay nothing. I was doing some calculations, and on the information that I have, in terms of people that previously would have been getting the maximum subsidy, if they were paying $7 a day, they would actually be paying more than what they were paying before. I wonder whether the minister can confirm this or whether she can explain a little bit further where the additional subsidy cuts in.
Hon. J. Pullinger: Since 1992 we have expanded supports to child care providers and parents quite significantly. As I said previously, the budget is now $188 million, and the number of spaces has gone from something like 31,000 to 71,000. It's been a pretty dramatic expansion.
A Voice: Forty-two.
Hon. J. Pullinger: Oh, 42,000 to 71,000 -- so a 66 per cent expansion. That's a pretty significant expansion already. Certainly it's been well received.
However, the problem is twofold: (1) finding adequate licensed child care, and (2) affordability. Even with the subsidy, most parents continue to pay on top of that. With the new system, we will start to create something that makes a little more sense to parents, but we will also be dropping the cost for all parents by close to half. Low-income parents will pay nothing. Even low-income parents are now paying for child care on top of the subsidy. All parents will pay much less, almost half as much. Low-income parents will pay significantly less than that -- or nothing, depending on how low-income.
K. Whittred: Sometimes even the best intentioned of programs have outcomes that are unanticipated. I can recall, for example, in another life and another time -- way back in the seventies -- I was a member of a group that lobbied the government very hard for the right of parents to deduct child care expenses from income tax. When I was first in the workforce, the amount that I put out in child care, of course, was not deductible. That was a good and desirable thing. But one of the outcomes of that was that once child care became deductible to the person paying it, it also meant the person receiving it had to pay tax on it. An outcome of that was that the cost of child care went up. Now, again, I'm not judging this. I'm saying that there is an unanticipated outcome sometimes.
To bring that model back to the current model of the government, the government is going to make child care spaces available at $7 a day in certain communities where they exist. It's going to expand in a few areas. One of the anticipated outcomes that I see is that it's going to make it impossible for all of those community day cares that currently exist. They can't function on $7 a day, and nobody is going to want to go to them for any more money. So I'm suggesting -- I don't know if this going to happen -- based on what I know in my own experience, that one of the outcomes could very possibly be that there will actually be a reduction of community day care, rather than more spaces. I wonder if the minister would like to comment on that.
[1035]
Hon. J. Pullinger: Actually, my concern, I think, is in the other direction. I've been very upfront. From the beginning I have said to people I've met with, and I've said to the public through the media, that we need to acknowledge that this is step 1 in a five- or six-year plan. That means that the system will be inherently unequal and unfair until it's fully implemented; we can't avoid that. The only way to avoid that is to take the member opposite's position and not do it. That is just something we don't want to do.
There will be inequalities. In my discussions with the child care community about the original intent of what we were going to do, certainly that kind of issue was raised. Based on feedback from the child care community and parents, instead of confining to school-based, we have decided to take all of the group licensed care -- from grade 1 to 12-year-olds -- so that all of them are included. That levels the playing field significantly.
I recognize that family care is not in the loop yet, nor are five-year-olds or younger, but that's a fact of life, if you're going to stage it one stage at a time. In terms of what will happen, by being as evenhanded as we can through every step we will cause the least disruption in the child care community for child care providers.
But I think we need to recognize that one of the problems we're trying to ultimately address here is the fact that the need, the demand, for child care far outstrips the supply. So in terms of other ones, I mean, the problem is more likely to be that people will be working very hard to get into the public system and will go -- you know, not be happy about having
[ Page 16242 ]
to pay more in the private system. That's understandable, but it's also unavoidable. So I'm not worried about them shutting down. But I am aware -- we're all aware -- that there'll be some frustration, because there will be some subsidized and some not; that's a fact of life when you step it in.
K. Whittred: I think the minister illustrated with her answer, really, part of the difference between her side and our side of the House. It's not about whether or not there is child care; it's about whether or not it all has to be in the same box. I simply don't see the system as public and private. There is no public day care; it is run by community agencies, and I am told the government doesn't plan to change that. Now, if the government plans to change that, then perhaps, like Quebec, it should be run through the school system. The after-school day care in Quebec is run through the school system.
So are we talking here, when the government talks about publicly funded
[1040]
Hon. J. Pullinger: I'll try again; I did this two or three times yesterday, but clearly the member's still not understanding.
Number one, we do not -- this ministry does not -- core-fund any child care right now. We provide minimal grants -- $2,000 to $3,000 to $5,000 -- for equipment and supplies. We provide a tiny bit of subsidy to try to top up the wholly inadequate wages that child care providers are paid. And we provide some subsidy to parents. We do not core-fund any child care from this ministry -- none, zero, nada -- at present. It is a private system that we provide support to, the same as your chamber of commerce comes for grants, the same as your community comes for little capital dollars, seed money to do things; it's no different. That doesn't make the chamber of commerce a public system. It doesn't happen.
So today we have a private system; it is run by societies, by cooperatives -- and some are businesses. What we're doing is that we will be contracting with the first piece, which is the group-licensed child cares that provide grade 1 to 12-year-old care, before- and after-school care. And we'll be core-funding that on contract. So that will become a publicly funded part of a child care system for the first time; that is the difference.
My second point is, and I've said this before a couple of times, that we've spent $188 million on those relatively fragmented programs for a very fragmented child care provision out there. And those will continue; I'm not going to change those programs.
K. Whittred: I assure the minister that I do understand; I understand perfectly. I think perhaps a better description would be to call it the third sector. I don't know what words we want to use.
But anyway, I would like to just follow up a little bit on what the minister said about the core funding and that this ministry does not core-fund any child care; that, I believe, is true. However, this leads into one of the other ministries which has caused a huge problem in some communities. That is the Children and Families ministry, which core-funds child development centres. I know that this ministry is not responsible for supported child care.
But in many communities in this province
Now what has happened is that the government in its wisdom has decided that these are not good. They are going to integrate the special needs children with "other child care facilities." This is the whole supported child care program. But what it means in those small communities is that these child care centres cannot function, and they are left with no child care facility.
Hon. J. Pullinger: I can't respond for the Minister for Children and Families. What I can say is that having been the Minister of Community Development, Cooperatives and Volunteers -- the first minister that put together the ministry -- I do know that there's a differentiation between voluntary organizations and organizations that function as an arm of government -- in other words, are 100 percent funded by government or an extension of government, a government service but community-based.
[1045]
At this time, I would be happy to read the list of names of the individuals
that are sitting at my child care implementation table. John Barton is there;
he's the principal of Jamieson Elementary. Carolyn Chalifoux; she's a labour
rep. Rita Chudnovsky is from Westcoast Child Care. Katrina Conroy, who is from
They're from all around the province, and they represent a very diverse set
of backgrounds. Many of them are from child care. Some of them
K. Whittred: I would like to ask the minister if the ministry has any
knowledge or any numbers on how many child care spaces in communities that I
have mentioned and I have personally been to -- I'm trying to recall
[ Page 16243 ]
where child care services have for years
And the child care spaces are being lost because the government has imposed its one-size-fits-all program on the communities. It has said, "We're going to deliver child care, whether it be for special needs children or typical children," and the spaces are disappearing. Does the ministry know how many spaces have been lost?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We have currently no program out there. I have no
idea what the member's talking about. We don't fund any child care per se from
this ministry at present. Let me repeat for the
K. Whittred: I'm sorry that the minister has no idea what I'm talking
about, because I'm really trying to explain it. And I think I've explained it
fairly well. In many of this province's small communities -- in fact, some of
them aren't even so small; I believe it's also occurring in Surrey -- there was
developed, over a number of years
My point is that because the government in another ministry is withdrawing core funding from the developmental child care centres and instituting what is known as supported child care, the province is losing child care spaces. Particularly, they're losing child care spaces in that very, very important toddler age group -- and in fact right up to school age. If the ministry is not aware of this, then I think the ministry should really look into it.
Hon. J. Pullinger: The member doesn't seem to be aware that this ministry does not deal with supported child care. She's talking to the wrong minister, if that's what she's dealing with.
[1050]
We're not drawing funds from anywhere; we have increased the funding dramatically in British Columbia. We've put in the child care resource and referral centres; we've done enormous work with the child care. But we have not withdrawn any funding; we're adding another $31 million to the already existing $188 million this year.
What is out there -- let me say again -- is a private sector system that is not funded by government other than in scattered grants of various kinds. So we haven't moved any of those. People apply for those grants. Individuals apply for child care subsidy; child care centres apply for emergency repair grants. That's it. We don't have any core funding out there to move from one place to another, so I think the member may want to talk to the Ministry for Children and Families about this.
K. Whittred: In fact, I have spoken to the Ministry for Children and Families about this, because it is a very serious issue. People in this province's small communities are seeing child care spaces disappear. And you know, on this side of the House we are not government; we do not have the resources to do anything about it. So I won't say any more about it, Mr. Chair. I have brought this to the attention of this minister; I have brought it to the attention of the Ministry for Children and Families. And I can assure the minister that my information is correct. I have seen it, I have talked to the people, and child care spaces are being lost -- excellent child care spaces are being lost -- because of what I think are changes in the rules.
Hon. J. Pullinger: What changes?
K. Whittred: The change that says we're no longer going to core-fund this program, that we are going to give supported child care.
I acknowledge to the minister that this is not this ministry. But it affects
children who are getting child care
The Chair: Thank you, member. I would
K. Whittred:
The Chair: Order, hon. member. I've been following this debate very carefully, and it appears that we seem to be stuck in an area of repetition and in particular, standing order 61, the requirement for relevancy in debate. It would only be subject matter that's under the direct administrative responsibility of the minister in front of us, whose estimates are being examined. I would ask all of the committee members to respect that relevancy rule and bring the questioning within the administrative capacity of the Ministry of Social Development and Economic Security.
Hon. J. Pullinger: There have been 342 new child care facilities licensed from September 1999 to January 24, 2000. That sounds like an increase to me -- 342 new facilities. They are in the capital health region, South Fraser, Vancouver, Fraser Valley, Simon Fraser, Thompson, central Vancouver Island, East Kootenay, Cariboo, upper Island, central coast, Peace-Liard, Okanagan-Similkameen, Kootenay-Boundary, Coast Garibaldi, North Shore, Richmond northwest, northern interior and northern Okanagan. All of them have seen an increase in the number of licensed child cares. We don't core-fund any at present; we will.
The member says that they're not in government; they can't do anything about it. But they've been very clear that they wouldn't bring in a child care system anyway.
K. Whittred: Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the admonishment.
I wonder if I could ask that the minister
[1055]
[ Page 16244 ]
Hon. J. Pullinger: Given that it's a market system, I would imagine the market would result in some shifts. Because it's not a publicly funded system, we don't know all of them. I don't have any information here to say how many licences, which is the only tracking we really have, may have been relinquished. The overall trend is dramatically upwards: 342 between September and January, and a change from 42,000 spaces in 1992 to 71,000 spaces by March last year. Clearly the trend is to increase, and to increase quite dramatically. That is in part because of demand and in part because there has been some encouragement and support through resource and referral centres, increased subsidies, etc. But the trend is upwards; there's no question.
K. Whittred: I am aware, certainly, that Granny Y's closed. That was licensed, I believe. There is one in my riding that closed, which I believe was a licensed child care centre. I don't know about others. I was interested in specific communities rather than aggregate numbers.
Hon. J. Pullinger: It seems to be classic market failure in that one. It was funded in part by employers and by labour. I understand that over time the costs have gone up in that organization -- which, by the way, my deputy started. Parents weren't able to pay the cost. It seems to me that's yet another argument for why we need a publicly funded comprehensive child care system.
K. Whittred: Just a couple of other areas I want to pursue in this. One is about the availability of space. I would like to know, from the minister, where the discussions are at the present time. If these new spaces, I gather, are to be created around schools, does the ministry anticipate that they will be in schools, on school grounds or near to schools? What is the plan? And have the conversations with the school district started?
Hon. J. Pullinger: School representatives are on the implementation team. Licensed group child care is in all of the locations that the member mentioned. I would assume that there will be similar diversity in any application for new places.
K. Whittred: That really wasn't my question. I know that there is a principal on the implementation team. That is not quite the same. I would like to know what arrangements have been made with school districts.
I'll tell you why I ask this question. We had a rather serious issue in my own riding around this, where there was a day care on a school site. The school was expanding, as is the case with almost every lower mainland district. There is simply no room in the schools, so if the ministry is looking to have this program in schools, I think there's going to be a difficulty. In the case of the issue in my riding, ultimately the school district had to move the day care, and those spaces were lost.
So the problem that I'm alluding to here is a conflict between the educational needs and the needs of the day care provider. So I'm asking: where is the ministry with those kinds of discussions?
[1100]
Hon. J. Pullinger: As well as virtually every child care group in the province, we have a superintendent, a trustee and a principal from the school system on the implementation team. They will work with us to set up the criteria for funding for new spaces. I'm sure that those kinds of issues will be worked out at the local level. In the meantime, there is a pipeline right to the implementation team for the school system and the child care community and parents and labour.
So these kinds of issues will be resolved in the community. The community will decide where it wants to open child care spaces, if it's going to apply for new funding. They can be anywhere the community wants to put them. That clearly is going to be based on providers', parents' and in some cases the school district's input, wishes and concerns. So it's going to be a community-based decision, and they will come forward and apply for funding for new spaces based on the criteria I've already laid out. I'm sure there will be other criteria; we'll have to fine-tune that screen. Funding will be provided on a priority basis.
K. Whittred: Has the ministry worked out a payment schedule to school districts? I'm curious about it. Does the child care facility lease space from the school districts, or what is the arrangement?
Hon. J. Pullinger: Once again, we will be contracting with the child care centres.
K. Whittred: So I understand that the child care centre would then do the financial arrangements. Is that correct?
Hon. J. Pullinger: Yes. The community will decide where the spaces are. They will have their own arrangements, and we will fund them through contract.
K. Whittred: Just one final little point I wanted to address in this area. The problem has come to my attention -- it's actually arisen a number of times -- and that is the problem surrounding the payment of subsidies. I am told by a number of providers that subsidies are frequently as much as three months in arrears. That makes it very difficult for the child care providers to function.
Hon. J. Pullinger: There was a backlog, certainly. The backlog has been cleared up. I understand it's three weeks now. But certainly as we move towards a publicly funded system, we will be ensuring that the relationship between government and the service providers is such that they can continue to be paid in a timely fashion.
K. Whittred: Just one final question. I believe that the government
has budgeted
A Voice: Sorry?
K. Whittred: For the first year of operation, is the budget $64 million?
Interjection.
The Chair: It would help debate if it was carried on through the Chair.
Hon. J. Pullinger: Gee, what a strange concept.
[ Page 16245 ]
The budget for this fiscal year, because we can't get it up and running, or
can't physically get it up and running until January 1
K. Whittred: The minister's going to have to help me with this arithmetic. The $14 million is for a three-month period -- January, February, March. That's the portion of the fiscal year. So for a whole year, I would multiply that by four. So I'm wondering: where does the $31 million come from?
[1105]
Hon. J. Pullinger: Those are the spike costs that I referred to.
Anytime you set up a new system, there's a spike in the costs at the front,
because there are costs to set up the system. We have to do some things, make
some changes within the ministry, to support such a system. There will be some
new spaces that will be supported. So those are the spike costs, and the rest is
K. Whittred: I wonder if the minister, then, could just clarify: is the $31 million the annual cost, or is that the spike cost?
Hon. J. Pullinger: It's $14 million in this year's budget to pay for one quarter, plus the startup costs. The annualized amount is $31 million.
K. Whittred: My final question on the child care segment is: what is the intent of the ministry if the cost goes beyond $31 million? Let's take a scenario; let's suppose that in December of a year the $31 million has been spent. What is the intent of the government?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We will be contracting with child care providers for a full fiscal year so that we will know before the fiscal year starts what the annual cost will be, and that's where it will remain.
K. Whittred: At this point we will move on to the labour market
component of the ministry. The first question I would have for the minister is
Hon. J. Pullinger: The Canada-B.C. agreement on labour market development, or what we call the LMDA, is intended to give the province an expanded role in the design and delivery of labour market development programs. It allows for the province and the federal government to negotiate the full transfer of the federal programs to the province.
K. Whittred: Within the long-term plans of the government, does the government foresee that the province would be assuming responsibility for all labour market programs in the future?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We have a framework through which we're working with the federal government, and I'm not prepared to speculate beyond that.
K. Whittred: The labour market development agreement is meant to assist people who are not currently in the labour market. I believe that is true. Can the minister enlighten me on how the agreement does in fact assist these people?
Hon. J. Pullinger: Although devolution hasn't happened, there is some crossover. There's some cross-referral as a result of this agreement. For example, something like 20,000 who use the B.C. Benefits income support programs received services under the agreement. So it does help participants in our programs, in that there's a little more flexibility in terms of going back and forth between the programs.
[1110]
K. Whittred: Under the framework of this agreement, does the province have any say in the allocation of funds for specific programs?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We set targets in terms of the numbers of individuals to participate in the given program, but the flexibility is in that kind of cross-linking. The federal government is still responsible for federal government programs.
K. Whittred: I wonder if the minister can tell me: does the province have a voice in terms of where the money goes, or are those decisions all made by HRDC?
Hon. J. Pullinger: HRDC designs its own programs.
K. Whittred: I wonder if the minister can give me an example, if there is one, of a program where there is a shared jurisdiction under the labour market agreement and just walk me through the process of how that works.
Hon. J. Pullinger: In some communities, for instance, there's a job search program run by the federal government, which we would refer our clients to.
K. Whittred: The ministry has hired more than 50 program referral officers to help income support clients access LMDA programs. That would indicate to me that there is in fact a fairly significant interchange and meshing between the ministry and HRDC. I wonder if the minister can tell me exactly where these offices are and what exactly they do.
Hon. J. Pullinger: Those referral officers, what they would
K. Whittred: One of the issues that has occurred to me, which comes out of this, is the waiting period. On provincial programs, the immediate waiting period was seven months -- it may be reduced now, I believe, to three months -- that is required for individuals who apply for B.C. benefits to receive
[ Page 16246 ]
access to training and so on. I am told that people who are involved with the HRDC programs in fact receive immediate training without having to wait the required time. They also have the benefit of higher living allowances. I'm wondering whether the minister doesn't believe that this is somewhat discriminatory, given that there are certain segments of people on B.C. Benefits who are receiving extra income as a result of their referral to an HRDC program as opposed to staying on the other program.
[1115]
Hon. J. Pullinger: If people move to the federal programs, they may get the federal support allowance, which is different from B.C. Benefits -- somewhere between EI and IA. What was the first part of the question? I forgot the first part of the question.
Interjection.
Hon. J. Pullinger: Oh, the fees. There are no fees, as there is no wait anymore.
K. Whittred: I would like to expand a little bit on the way that the labour market development agreement works. There is much, much information out about it, particularly on the Net and so on, and yet it is something that we don't hear a great deal about. I'm trying to discover the degree, if you like, of cooperation, and so on, between the various provincial and federal programs. Now, it mentions that the LMDA is structured, first of all, with a secretariat. So I would ask: what does the secretariat do, and what is its role?
Hon. J. Pullinger: The secretariat is made up of staff from the Ministry of Advanced Education, my ministry and the federal government -- HRDC. It supports the comanagement committee, which is chaired by my deputy.
K. Whittred: And what types of decisions does the comanagement committee make?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We set targets, such as the 20,000 I spoke of, and make sure that appropriate accountability measures are in place. We're dealing with two levels of government. Also, that committee determines how best to share information to make it all happen and work well.
K. Whittred: Now, I would like to enlarge a little bit on what you said about targets and accountability. How does this management team set targets? Are targets set as the number of people that are going to get a job? Are targets set as the number of people that might take courses? What are the kinds of targets that we're talking about?
[1120]
Hon. J. Pullinger: The targets are set by region, by program and by the needs of particular kinds of participants.
K. Whittred: That still doesn't really address what I was trying to ask. Perhaps the minister could give me an example of a target.
Hon. J. Pullinger: In a specific region there may be a high number of single parents who are on income assistance and who were previously on employment insurance -- or UIC, as it once was. The committee, the deputy chairs, will say: "Look, there's a disproportionate number of single parents in this community." Then they will work to make sure that there are targets set for moving those individuals who are not being well served into programs.
K. Whittred: Another part of the minister's previous answer was about sharing information. The minister has given an example of single parents and what the needs might be. Yesterday I asked the minister whether or not the ministry had information on tracking individuals, and the answer was no. Now it would appear that there is some sharing of information. What kind of data is kept? If they're going to create these targets, exactly what information do they use?
Hon. J. Pullinger: The member was asking previously about tracking
individuals off income assistance. We don't do that at all. The detailed
information about an individual
But because we write a cheque every month to all of the people currently on the caseload, we clearly know where they are. There isn't a comprehensive file of any kind, but we do tend to know information on the number of single parents in region X, because we're writing support cheques to them. That's the people existing on the caseload; it's not backward-looking information. It's not off the caseload, which are the things that the member was about before.
K. Whittred: Now, in doing my own preparation and research about the labour market stuff, it is quite comprehensive and little bit confusing. I'm wondering whether the ministry has any kind of an organizational chart, a flow chart, that I could get, which that would just help me work my own way through this information.
[1125]
Hon. J. Pullinger: Within the labour market branch, we have a group that does all the LMDA-related work. The head of that group is the person that sits on the secretariat. That's the org chart.
K. Whittred: Thank you. Because the LMDA is part of a negotiation process consisting of two phases, it's correct to assume, I think, that the first phase is completed in its entirety. Is that a correct assumption?
Hon. J. Pullinger: They're frameworks. The one that was signed in '97, which is ongoing, is a framework through which we're working. Phase 2 is not yet signed off, so we're still working under the original framework.
K. Whittred: Now, is it possible for the minister to provide me with any further information about the ongoing talks, I would assume, that are related to phase 2?
Okay -- moving on. One of the things that the ministry has provided me with -- in fact, this was provided, I think, to all members -- is a copy of the host agencies for the Job Start program. I was a little disappointed, because I had asked repeatedly for the names of the host agents who are the various other programs, and I have never received those.
[ Page 16247 ]
So I wonder whether or not the ministry could provide me with these host agencies for some of the other programs. This would include the targeted wage subsidies, the self-employment programs, the skills development employment benefits, the employment assistance service, the labour market partnerships and research and innovations.
Hon. J. Pullinger: All of that information already exists. It's in the public accounts.
K. Whittred: I am aware that it's in public accounts. It is, however, for a member of the opposition -- either myself or my staff -- an extremely tedious process to go through public accounts and pick out every single agency that has received funding from this ministry. I just wonder what the problem is. It was provided for the Job Start host agencies. These agencies are well known, and it simply enables the opposition to be more effective in our questioning. So I wonder why the minister is so reluctant to provide us with that information.
Hon. J. Pullinger: We have hundreds of contracts. In the same vein, I am not prepared to use my staff time to organize the member opposite's information. It's all publicly available; it's in the public accounts. The member is suggesting that I should divert staff time to do some research for her and pull things together. I would suggest that information is publicly available; if she wishes to look at it, she can certainly find it.
K. Whittred: I would then ask the minister about why every member of this Legislature -- I think all 79 of us -- were provided this particular letter. It was sent out on May 8, and it says, "Dear Colleague," which means it was not very personally addressed to any of us. It includes a database of the Job Start host agency contracts. The information I am asking for is probably available simply to be printed out in a similar kind of database. So my question, then -- I've already had the previous question answered -- is: why was the ministry so eager to circulate this information to all 79 members but reluctant to give similar information on other programs within the ministry to the critic of the official opposition?
[1130]
Hon. J. Pullinger: The Job Start is a useful piece of information. I think there was some other information that I circulated with that. Anyway, the letter went out as just an advisory of the Job Starts that were coming and just seemed to be a useful piece of information. Part of our initiative is to ensure that we can recruit employers, and making MLAs aware certainly doesn't hurt in that particular program. I think probably the member got a windfall -- a little piece of information that was sent to her under my signature -- and that's great. But we're not prepared to go through everything in the ministry to satisfy the opposition's desire to have that kind of information. It is publicly available, and I'm glad we provided that little piece for the member. I'm happy that we did that, and the rest is available publicly.
K. Whittred: I do want to leave it on the record, Mr. Chair, that this particular piece of information was not supplied just to me; it went out as a piece of government information to every member. It certainly wasn't anything that came to me as critic. I will simply leave it on the record that I have not received one single piece of the information that I have asked for from the ministry.
Moving on, HRDC Canada has many program titles that it distributes money to. Does the LMDA permit the province and HRDC to work together on any of the following program titles: the youth employment initiative; the learning and literacy programs; social development programs; transitional job fund and labour market programs?
Hon. J. Pullinger: We don't control any of those programs; they're all controlled by HRDC. We simply refer to HRDC by the system I outlined previously.
K. Whittred: I want to just reconfirm with the minister that the ministry refers clients to these programs but that there is no joint planning and no working together in a cooperative manner on the delivery of these programs.
Hon. J. Pullinger: We work cooperatively together to identify need and targets, as I outlined earlier. But after that's done, we then refer to HRDC those individuals -- the number of individuals that have been agreed to. HRDC will then, in turn, refer them to their programs, which they control and run themselves.
K. Whittred: Mr. Chair, I would like to ask the minister: when the ministry is making decisions about who it is going to contract with -- and I might add that my job would have been a whole lot simpler if I had some examples to use, but I don't have that -- what kind of checks are required by the agencies? Now, I know this is not the government; it would be the agencies. But what kinds of background checks does the government look for when it is making a contract with an agency about where it is going to place its program money, regardless of which program it might be?
[1135]
Hon. J. Pullinger: Through the RFP process we look at things like their experience, what they've proposed, the business plan they've put forward and certainly their track record -- how they might have performed in the past -- because obviously we want to ensure that those contracting to deliver these services can do that in an effective and efficient way.
K. Whittred: I believe that the response, that the minister gave me would be the criterion that the ministry is looking for from the contractor. I am asking: does the ministry have any guidelines, criteria, expectations around what the contractor should look for in terms of the businesses that it is placing its client with?
Hon. J. Pullinger: Give me an example.
K. Whittred: Well, an example might be in the Business Works program where a contractor is going into the community and seeking businesses to put a client with. That business is going to receive a subsidy through the contractor; ultimately, it originates with the ministry. So my question is really asking: what are the expectations about where the ministry's money actually ends up? Are there any?
Hon. J. Pullinger: What we want to ensure is that those who contract with the ministry are able to find businesses who will, under the Business Works program, enter into the appropriate agreement and ensure that the individual gets the workplace-based training that they're contracted for. We don't
[ Page 16248 ]
have criteria -- which kind of business. But obviously we would expect that they would obey the law, certainly with labour standards, WCB -- all of those kinds of things. But that is the law, so I think asking people if they would obey the law would be a little redundant. I mean, they're expected to obey the law.
We simply try to find people who are effective, community groups that are effective at moving people from income assistance into a situation where they can get the experience, the confidence and the skills they need to get on with their lives and be independent.
K. Whittred: Moving on, I guess perhaps this is part of the same parcel, but I wanted to ask about accountability. What kind of accountability measures does the minister have in place? I can again give an example. This is just one example that came across my desk. This came from a small business person who in fact had a client from a program, and the client did not work out. There was some lapse of time before the money no longer came to the business. Now, that may be an isolated incident, and I don't believe that there's a widespread problem in that regard. My question would be: what accountability measures are in the system to ensure that even the odd incident is hopefully not occurring?
[1140]
Hon. J. Pullinger: First and foremost, if somebody's fraudulently getting funds, I would expect that they would report it. If they're not, they're violating the law. If somebody is getting a cheque that they shouldn't be getting, they should return the cheque and say: "Don't send me another cheque." So that's the first check. But we do monitor the performance of contracting agencies.
We monitor their financial reporting requirements and their financial controls on the payment process. Final payment is released when we have verified that all the service delivery and reporting requirements have been met. We conduct internal and external reviews and audits where necessary. We work with the risk management branch and the internal audit branch and with an Attorney General solicitor where we think that's necessary. That's really kind of a scale of things that we do, with obviously the last being in some extreme situations.
K. Whittred: Can the minister tell me
Hon. J. Pullinger: On the workplace-based training, it's not really a subsidy per se, although you can certainly characterize it that way. It's a contract to provide training to the individual who is placed there. I guess the carrot for the employer is that they also have access to funds to train some of their other employees, rather than the old subsidy system. All of that work is done by the person who contracts with government, so they provide the subsidy.
K. Whittred: So any money that changes hands then goes through the contractor, and there is no money that is given directly to businesses. Is that a correct conclusion?
Hon. J. Pullinger: Yes, that's correct. I'm advised that we've shifted
the program somewhat, and the training goes to the individual. We subsidize the
individual through the employer. The money that goes to the employer is now
targeted just to the individual who's placed, so I misspoke when I said
K. Whittred: From what I have been able to ascertain, it appears that the provincial government will receive about $265 million from the federal government's EI account for employment benefits and measures. Is that correct?
Hon. J. Pullinger: That is the amount that I understand may be on the table for complete devolution, so we'd probably get at least that much expense with the money. Given the way negotiations can go, I'm quite sure that the federal government's bargaining position will be a net gain to the federal government. That's the way bargaining works, so I don't imagine there's any gifts hidden in that amount of money.
K. Whittred: According to the information I have -- it's right here, page 201 -- the amount of money is $265,920,000. This is right off the government's web page, so I have to assume it is correct.
So the first question is: how does the government intend to spend this money? Also, what might the government have done with the money in the other years? Is this part of the money that goes into the various job search programs? Exactly what happens to this money?
[1145]
Hon. J. Pullinger: That amount is not in my estimates. That is HRDC money that they spend on programs.
K. Whittred: I see. So this money, then, that is related to the
Hon. J. Pullinger: The agreement is a framework through which we work together and refer clients back and forth, notably people who have been on EI and are now on income assistance, for a variety of reasons. We don't fund their programs; they don't fund our programs. The amount the federal government spends is, I guess, the amount of the programs they have continued to fund after the cuts they made.
The Chair: Member, minding the time.
K. Whittred: A couple more questions on this area
The Chair: Minister, minding the time.
[ Page 16249 ]
Hon. J. Pullinger: I have no idea what the federal government does or doesn't do, except I know they have a problem. But our programs have been extremely effective. We have the lowest number of people using the income assistance programs since 1981. We are seeing people placed in jobs with an average of something around $9.50 an hour through the workplace-based training and the jobs partnership. We contract with agencies and organizations -- essentially an arm of government -- to deliver services, and clearly the programs this government has designed have been pretty spectacularly successful.
But I would like to say as well that we don't take the approach that any one program will solve the problem. We have seen a remarkable -- actually, dramatic -- drop in the number of single parents and families on income assistance as a result of things like the B.C. family bonus, B.C. Healthy Kids, a better minimum wage, employment standards that include more people, etc. So we take a cross-government approach, of which placing people in jobs is only one part. But you have to make sure that the job is a decent job with some kind of security, when it gets there.
K. Whittred: Noting the time, I would move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.
Motion approved.
The committee rose at 11:50 a.m.
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